Reaction Engines, the UK company developing a hybrid engine blending jet and rocket technology, has raised £26.5m by securing backing from Rolls-Royce and Boeing HorizonX Ventures.
Abingdon headquartered Reaction Engines will use the funding to support its development of its SABRE (Synergetic Air-Breathing Rocket Engine), which is capable of Mach 5 in air-breathing mode and Mach 25 in rocket mode for space flight.
As part of the SABRE program, Reaction Engines developed an ultra-lightweight heat exchanger that stops engine components from overheating at high speeds, which improves access to hypersonic flight and space.
Rolls-Royce and Boeing HorizonX Ventures, the investment arm of Boeing, join BAE Systems, which invested £20.6m in Reaction Engines in 2015 and is providing further investment in this round. Financial investments in Reaction Engines will also be made by Baillie Gifford Asset Management and Woodford Investment Management.
READ OUR 2012 Q&A FEATURE ON SABRE HERE
The company said it anticipates further investment interest in this funding round from existing shareholders and other financial institutions. All investments will take the form of a subscription for new shares.
“These new partners bring invaluable expertise in both hypersonics and engine technologies with significant access to target markets,” said Mark Thomas, chief executive of Reaction Engines. “This is not only a vote of confidence in our technology but also underlines belief in our ability to develop a thriving commercial business which will provide strong financial returns for our shareholders.”
The investments agreed to date take the total raised by Reaction Engines in the last three years to over £100m, including £60m of UK government funding commitments, and will support key elements of the company’s SABRE development programme.
Reaction Engines said it recently achieved a number of milestones for the development of SABRE, and is on track for the test of the engine core in 2020. It is currently constructing a new facility in Westcott, Buckinghamshire for SABRE testing.
The fundraising will also allow Reaction Engines to accelerate its commercialisation plans, with proprietary technology opportunities in motorsport, electric vehicle thermal management, waste heat recuperation, small satellite cooling and aero-engines.
The company has continued to grow its presence in the United States and recently secured a contract from the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to conduct high-temperature airflow testing of a Reaction Engines pre-cooler heat exchanger.
In the early 40s (via Whittle and contemporary German Engineers) the reciprocating engines then in use (and most of the engineering was required to convert reciprocating to rotary motion) were eclipsed by the earliest jets’ Are we at a new turning(sorry) point in Engineering evolution?
I have been following Reaction engines for some time now and it is so good to see them acquiring much needed funding from big important companies, and I will look forward to the launch of the planned space plane, much better than the giant fireworks they are currently using to get into space
In any new venture it is important to get as many investors over a wide range as possible .This is a world beater and so to have all the large leading companies on board is the right thing to do -we must not let this chance go .
Good news but I just hope that any any involvement by Boeing does not result in Skylon being abandoned, the engine migrating into a Boeing-designed airframe and all flight testing transferred Stateside. If that occurs, it may just become another aerospace project handed over to the United States.
Undoubtedly. A British Engineer’s lot is not a happy one.
I reflect the fears of many when learning of new developments in the SABRE saga: will this unique technology be grabbed from yet another UK initiative? Will we clever enough in patent-rights as we are in such world-beating ideas as Reaction Engines’? I hope and pray so.
While I appreciate that single countries/entities are no longer capable of this sort of development alone , I hope that involving Boeing, BAE Systems, Rolls Royce and possibly Space X in future does not eclipse the significance of the initial developer Alan Bond, and an appreciation of the nurturing nature of the British culture in which it has flowered.